Instructor Notes:

For materials preparations, click ‘Back to Main Menu’ button and select ‘Getting Started – EDC Setup’.

Read Every Day Counts Teacher’s Guide, Kanter and Gillespie, Great Source, 2005 or 2012 edition, p. 41-43.

Children enjoy having input into class preference graphs and checking out the results. Decide together on a question such as, “Which of these three pets would you prefer?” (illustrated in the T. Ed.) or “Which of these colors do you like best?” or “Which of these fruits do you like best?” (as shown in photo)

We suggest having everyone make their choice at once or use a “voting booth” during the day, and have children put their chosen markers into a bag, so they are not influenced by other children’s choices. Then reveal the results throughout the month.

We’ve found that displaying chunks of the data, a little at a time, instead of placing all the markers on the graph at once, increases the interest and the learning. In the first discussion, children count, compare, and order very small quantities. As another handful of markers is added every week or so, children get to work with increasing quantities and revisit the language of comparing many times.